Ingrge jogged past Berthold, came even with Yevele, then passed her. The elf began the swing-ahead pace of a scout.
Here the air was still and dry. He was thankful it was warmer than along the merchant trail and in the scrub lands. But it was certainly not warm enough to shed either his wool tunic or cloak. When he’d been through the desert before, the heat was intense, but not unbearable.
The sand made a shushing sound when his boots struck it. He ran in time with the beat of his heart, breathing deep. He could smell Yevele and Berthold, and himself, all of them in need of a good scrubbing and a change of clothing. Still, he could smell the sand itself, earthy and flecked with the husks of scorpions, laced with the skins and bones of long-dead lizards and snakes. He could also smell a trace of water in the air. Perhaps it might rain even in this dry place.
No plants to be seen, just the never-ending sea of sand and rocks, rising in places to arch as waves on water. It made him think of
Florida again, and the forty-two steps to the beach he’d trot after waking up in the afternoon. He liked to swim out to a sandbar, get a little exercise in before going in for the evening shift. A good swim worked up his appetite. Sometimes he’d bring a lunch with him, sprawl on the sand and eat two cold chicken sandwiches, plenty of mayo and pickles, wash it down with a diet soda. He’d sit back and think about the evening’s stint and if there were any special promotions he had to highlight, concert tickets to give away. If he was featuring an artist, he’d run over the trivia in his head, when the singer moved to Nashville, what was the first song he or she managed to get air play. Now he was having trouble remembering any of the minutiae about even his favorite stars. How old was Willie Nelson? How much money did he owe the government in taxes? What was the first line in "Whiskey River?”
“Forty-two steps to the beach, fifty-seven to the sea,” he said, repeating it like a mantra. Then he mumbled his telephone number, stumbling a bit, then getting it right. “Address. Birthdate.” He bit down on his lip and repeated everything, not wanting to lose his real self to this world. “Forty-two steps.”
In the distance there was a dune, and he made his way toward it, intending to climb it for a better look at the land, as he continued to recite the numbers. A glance over his shoulder revealed that Yevele was a lew hundred yards behind him, Berthold a little farther back. He motioned to her, then pointed to the dune, angled toward it and ran faster.
Ingrge focused on the dune, the smells and sounds of the desert, the play of the still air against his face as he rushed across the sand, not cold like along the merchant trail, but not quite warm. Certainly it was pleasant compared to the weather of the past many days. He closed his eyes for the briefest of moments, allowing himself to savor the desert. Then his eyes snapped open — there was no mistaking that he was being pulled into the sand.
“Yevele!” he managed to shout before he was sucked down, trapped up to his waist. He struggled to pull himself out, hands flailing to find a purchase, fingers closing on a rocky outcropping and grabbing tight. He was steady for the moment, listening to his ragged breath and the pounding of Yevele and Berthold’s feet across the sand. The tip of her shadow stretched out and touched him, then he was yanked completely under.
“Didyou see him?” Yevele spun this way and that, hand cupped over her eyes and searching the desert tor any sign of Ingrge. “1 could’ve sworn he was here. He motioned me toward the dune. That dune." She gestured with the tip of her sword. She’d drawn the weapon the moment she lost sight of him.
“I wasn’t looking for him,” Berthold admitted. “I was watching you, following you." The thief pulled his hood back, as if unshading his eyes might help him find the elf. “Ingrge!” He hollered louder: “Ingrge! Where are you?”
They were quiet for a moment, looking this way and that.
“I heard him before,” Yevele said. “I heard him yell.”
“Well, I don’t hear anything." There was worry in the thief’s voice, and he drew one of his daggers, dropping his attention to the sand. “I see his tracks.” The thief started following them, slowly and carefully, looking to his sides as he went. “He came this way. See?”
Yevele followed him for a change. “But they stop. His footprints just. . . stop.”
Berthold knelt at the last footprint and started moving the sand around with a dagger. “There’s a depression here.” He started digging with the dagger, after a moment finding that futile. He sheathed it and started digging with cupped hands. “A little help would be useful.” Yevele refused to sheath her sword. Instead, she kicked the sand away Berthold sputtered when he got a face full of it.
“A little less help would be even better,” he said. “Why don’t you just stand guard?”
She ignored him, continuing to kick at the sand. He closed his eyes and kept digging, spitting the sand out of his mouth.
"Gotta find him,” he whispered. "God, don’t let me be stuck in the desert with this woman.” A pause: "Ingrge! Yevele, 1 think he’s under the sand. I think I hear something.”
She kicked away harder, and he dug faster, then suddenly he went head-first into the sand, swallowed up by it.
She disappeared a moment later.
They landed on a mound of sand in an underground cavern. It was as dark as night, the shadows so thick they could make out only vague shapes. The cavern was heavy with a foul scent neither of them could identify.
Berthold was spitting sand out of his mouth and furiously wiping at his face. On his hands and knees, his fingers danced across the sand until they found Yevele. She slapped his hand away.
"Ingrge!” Yevele was on her feet, trying to make out more detail. She looked up, seeing a pale spot on the ceiling above her. It was a small hole they’d fallen through, and the sand had filled it back in. But a little light shone through the sand covering. "Ingrge!”
"Ingrge!” Her shout was close to a scream.
"Here.” That was his voice.
"Heeeeeere,” parroted the dragon that had him pinned beneath a claw. The beast opened his eyes, and the yellow glow from them faintly helped to illuminate the chamber. “Heeeeeere.”
The dragon was not near as large as the gold one Yevele had encountered the first time she traveled to Quag Keep. It was as long as two war-horses nose to tail, and had a snout that was faintly equine. The glowing scales were the size ol pebbles, a dull brown, practically the color of the sand overhead, and it had stubby horns that stuck out from above leathery ears. Its shining eyes were its most striking feature . . . those and the blood-red claws that threatened to puncture Ingrge's chest.
“Heeeeeere,” the dragon repeated. Its eyes bore into Yevele’s.
"You make a move,” the thief cautioned Yevele, "and that beast is going to skewer your friend."
The battlemaid hissed, but held still. Her fingers turned bone-white in the punishing grip she kept locked on her sword pommel.
“Are you all right?" she risked as she managed to pry her eyes from the dragon’s and look to Ingrge.
The elf offered her a weak smile. She couldn’t see him clearly, shadowed by the dragon’s body, the shadows from the cavern’s wall stretching out. But he seemed intact, and she didn’t see any blood.
“It pulled me under,” he explained. His voice was weak since the dragon’s claw was pressing against his chest and making it difficult for him to talk. “My fault. I wasn’t careful enough. For once I wasn’t paying attention. And look where it got us.”
“Heeeeeere," the dragon said. “Heeeeeere. Heeeeeere. Heeeeeere. Heee — ”
“Enough!” Yevele barked. “Can’tyou say anything else, beast?” The dragon cocked its head, curls of steam rising from its nostrils. Even in this gloom, the air shimmered around its face, the way the air shimmers over the sand on a hot day. “Beeeeeeast,” it pronounced slowly. “Beeeeeast heeeeeere. Beast here.” Its eyes brightened, seemingly pleased that it had mastered two human words. “Beast here," it repeated. “Beast here. Beast here.”
>
“Lovely” Yevele growled. “Yes, the beast is here, right in front of me. But what to do about it?” She still hadn’t made any attempt to free the elf. Her gaze moved between Ingrge and the dragon’s eyes. “Got to do something. You have any ideas, Bert? ”
“Berrrrrrt.” The word sounded like a purr coming from the dragon. The dragon repeated it—over and over, and louder. It sent a tremor through the cavern. Sand filtered through the hole in the ceiling, pouring down on Yevele until the sand was above her knees. The tremor continued, the dragon still repeating the word. No more sand filtered down, however, and the hole was clear to the sky.
Yevele spit sand from her mouth and shook her head, sand flying from her hair and catching the light that came in through the hole. She could see much better now, with the added light, and she could tell that the cavern was huge. The source of the foul odor became immediately apparent. There were piles of dragon dung here and there. “Berthold?”
“I see them, Yevele.”
There were also two other dragons. These were not quite as large as the one that continued to pin Ingrge, but they were close. They’d been against one of the far walls, but were now slinking nearer, making a sound that was similar to sand being blown by a strong wind.
“Yevele, I don’t think we’re going to reach Quag Keep anytime soon.”
“Not in this lifetime,’’ she answered. Then she swallowed hard and redoubled the grip on her sword’s pommel. She was trembling all over, and sweat was beading on her forehead. "None of us will make it there in this lifetime.”
“Berrrrrrt,” the first dragon pronounced. “Bert. Here, Bert.” It crooked a talon from its free claw and motioned the thief to come closer. The steam rose in thicker spirals from its nostrils.
THIRTEEN
The Village Hart
The merchant caravan was angling its way north, the trail running parallel to a slow, wide river called the Amber Serpent. Milo walked on the riverside, alert for the most part, but occasionally letting his gaze drift to the water. He watched a string of “insect boats,” cupped leaves that were carrying beetles and carpenter ants south. And he wondered if the insects had accidentally been swept up, or if they had enough intelligence to know to look for easy passage to a clime where they might not end up frozen to the foliage.
Milo knew he wouldn’t mind a nice, lazy boat ride now. Back in Wisconsin, living so close to a lake, he used to take rides on the big paddlewheels. The older he got, the fewer rides he took, and last year he’d been out only once — and this only because he’d found a coupon tor a half-price dinner cruise discarded on the sidewalk. Now he wished he hadn’t considered the boat trips "old hat” and that he hadn’t taken the lake for granted. It would be gorgeous this time of year, the trees ringing it so bright with fall colors, all of it reflecting on a glass surface — the stuff of postcards and jigsaw puzzles.
His feet were sore, that’s what made him think about the paddle-wheels and home, he told himself. It would be heaven to sit down on a padded deck chair and watch the trees and the last of the tourists go by in their expensive sailboats. His town was better in the fall, the stunted streets no longer bumper-to-bumper with cars bearing Illinois plates. Oh, the "flatlanders” were still in evidence, there just weren’t so many of them. Their numbers started to thin after Labor Day. He remembered liking the smell in the fall, less gasoline fumes, the breeze off the lake bringing the not-unpleasant scents of dying leaves. If he made it back home, he’d spend more time at the lake, he decided. More boat rides, more loaves of bread to feed the geese.
Milo was in excellent physical shape, strong and no longer aching from the wounds in his legs — all that were left were scabs where the skeletal fingers had dug in, souvenirs of his ordeal with the undead. But, oh, how his feet ached from walking so many days, his feet sliding back and forth in these leather boots Ludlow Jade had provided. Calluses and blisters.
Milo had been sparring with Naile at night, both of them deciding they needed some practice to keep their fighting skills up. The two were pretty equally matched, Milo with his sword and Naile with the twin hand axes, and both were holding back just a little. Milo wondered which of them would win if the fight was for real. There’d be no sparring tonight, he decided. There’d be only sleep, and maybe ointment for his blisters if he could talk the "elixir” peddler out of something in exchange for brushing down some horses.
Milo watched the last of the insect boats slip from sight and spotted a section of the river that looked shallow because of a rise in the rocky bed.
“I’ll catch up,” he hollered to Ludlow Jade. “I’m going to refill my skins.” Then he stepped between a pair of spindly river birches and trundled down the slope, kneeling at the bank and pulling two waterskins from his belt. He drank what little was left in one of the skins, then he refilled it. Then he dumped the old water out of the second skin and filled it to the brim.
Another insect boat went past.
Milo stared at the water and at his reflection distorted by ripples.
He’d not shaved in the past few days, and so an uneven stubble was growing on his face. Neither had he combed his hair, and so he looked scruffy. Dark circles ringed his eyes, evidence he hadn’t slept well since the incident with the undead. He used to sleep deeply, even in Wisconsin—where sometimes he didn’t hear the alarm go off and ended up late to work. But not anymore. Every little creak from one of the wagons, a snort from one of the horses, someone talking in their dreams . . . any noise seemed to wake him and send him reaching for his sword. He had nightmares about the undead, and sometimes he became one of them.
As he stared at the water, he imagined himself with gray flesh and hollow eyes. A shiver raced down his spine.
“Get a grip,” he told himself. Then he splashed some water on his face and neck, pushed himself away from the bank, and hurried to catch up to Ludlow Jade s wagons. He was more wary as he resumed his post, thinking about the undead and wondering why they had attacked the caravan. Then he found himself thinking about Yevele. Was Naile thinking about the battlemaid, too? Was she safe? Did her feet ache as bad as his?
Ludlow Jade had been upset to discover Yevele and Ingrge gone from the caravan. The merchant especially fumed over the absence of the elf, who'd been serving as the caravan’s scout and who occasionally hunted and provided fresh venison. Naile and Milo didn't volunteer any information about their missing friends, claiming not to know where they were. It was the truth, Milo thought. He didn’t know where they were. He simply knew where they were going.
In the first few days since the pair had vanished, Ludlow Jade took it out on Milo and Naile. He didn’t work them harder, but gone was the pleasant demeanor and kind words he’d been treating them to. Instead, he gave them a cold shoulder, talked to them only about which wagons they would walk next to and when they could ride. And he shared none of the apples from the bushels he bought in Wheaton Dale.
They reached the village called Hart early in the afternoon. It was larger than the previous stop, and it was mostly a collection of farmers and miners. Milo had overheard a couple of the merchants talking earlier. There was a copper mine at the western edge of the village, and though it had been mined for well more than a decade, it was still providing enough copper to keep the village going. The mine belonged to the country’s Council of Lords, who had it minted into the “coin of realm.’’ The miners were paid well, and a share was held back by the village, which was fashioned into jewelry, tools, and cookware. Some of the merchants in the caravan had plans to buy the copper goods and resell them when they returned to the city. However, Ludlow Jade did not seem interested in copper.
Only a few of the village homes could be considered shabby, and these were on the south end where the caravan entered. They were weather-beaten woodplank with thatch roofs, and it looked like a strong wind might topple them.
“The old ones,’’ Zechial explained. “Old folks who haven’t coins for better places, some of them squandering
their earnings from the mine in their earlier years. The village elders make sure they have roofs over their heads, and they live off charity."
Milo mused that he wouldn’t mind sleeping in one of those shacks, having tired of sleeping under the second of Ludlow Jade’s wagons.
The rest of the residences were in far better shape, most of them being made of stone, mudded tightly together in spacious round affairs with wood and tile roofs. The doors and shutters were painted shades of greens and browns, and the larger homes had family crests painted high on the doors.
The caravan settled on the east quarter of the city, near a large pond where white ducks swam. Ludlow Jade dismissed his guards for the remainder of the afternoon, directing Naile and Milo to come back by sunset for dinner. His other two guards were spending the night in the village inn with coins the merchant had paid them.
There was a bakery, and Naile and Milo stopped in front of it first. The scents of bread baking, cinnamon, apples, and vanilla wafted out and set their mouths to watering.
“I’d buy every last thing in there. Every loaf of bread, every pie, every everything. If I had money. I’m a lawyer, Milo. In Brooklyn,
I ’d stop by Chayhana on Thirteenth most Wednesdays for lunch with some of the associates or with a client. Evenings, sometimes I’d go to Mezzanote or La Tra Torria, or even Michael’s if I felt like dressing up or if I had a date. Maybe carry-out from Short Ribs on Eighty-Sixth Street, not too far from my apartment. For two weeks now we’ve been eating dried beef and beans, and those rock-crackers.” “Hardtack, I think they call it.”
“Tooth-busters is a better name.” Naile looked in the window and his eyes watered, too. “I might go out tonight, foraging. See if I can dig something up better than that hardtack.”
“Rooting, you mean. As a boar.”
“I suppose you could call it that. I prefer to call it filling my belly. ” Milo stared at an apple pie that was placed in the window by a pasty-faced man with flour on his arms and face. “I’d like to fill my belly with that pie.’’
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